Please ignore for uno momento why millions of dollars of taxpayers money worldwide is going into studies that show that the true taste of food comes from a combination of how it smells, looks, sounds and finally, environment – believe it. No wonder then idiotic cooking courses, useless cookery shows and silly cooking competitions place a lot of onus on the presentation/garnishing and restaurants focus on ambience and the “experience” rather than the food itself. For example, there are morons in Canada who eat in total darkness to enhance the smells and sounds and taste. Then there are these morons in USA who eat in complete silence. Yet another morons in Germany who cook meals chromatically i.e. based on colour. Here we are as a species struggling to put even basic food on the plates of all humans, struggling to scrape funding for space travel etc. and here are people who are spending their entire lives obsessed with food. If only all these researchers who made such bad life decisions and funding bodies who made such bad financial decisions could have heard a quip by one Sadhana Vishnu Vardhan on 23rd April of some year outside the canteen of NIT-Warangal – “… canteen food taste is because of the canteen …” How true and words to live or rather to keep up with food analogy, “eat” by -
In other words, the secret ingredient for the taste is the street – the pollution, the filth, the dirt, the particulates, the gutter, the parasites, the flies, the stagnation, the germs, the stench, the putridicity et al. – don’t let the ‘Kung-Fu Panda’ motto of no secret ingredient in secret noodle soups and blank dragon scrolls fool you with its epiphany.

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People have been saying that it has been pretty hot recently and some astrologers are even blaming it on iron-leg politicians and their muhurtham/timing of their swearing-in ceremonies. You know when there is no news when reams of newsprint is dedicated to the weather but digression apart, for those interested, it has been a great summer for me personally (stay tuned for new creative properties), the occassional stuck umbrellas and bird droppings whilst under trees notwithstanding – As for why the umbrella is yellow, it is a homage/ode/wink/nod/reference to the CBS sitcom "How I Met Your Mother" which finally ended and is good riddance but when you think about it, it was all about a friggin yellow umbrella and the show made millions and careers inspite of the fact it had horrible characters, campy dialogue, cheesy situations (even for a sitcom) and what not. However, the final episode has a good word-play on the T.M initials engraved on the yellow umbrella standing for ‘Ted Mosby’, ‘Tracy McConnell’ AKA ‘The Mother’. Oh well… one finds traces of gold even in bird poop if one looks hard enough I suppose. Way to follow a thought, eh?

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Just been to the voting booth, polling-station#192 at Andhra University to be precise, voted and got inked… err, pressed some buttons for all one can say in India is exactly this for there has been quite a hue and cry and controversy of rigging the electronic voting machines (EVM) which are yet to be resolved. Digression apart and a standard disclaimer is that I could be way off base here but the pulse of the public at the booths and queues is that Congress is a sinking ship and I just could not stop myself from doing this for it was just too easy and low-hanging for me to ignore it - I would not dismiss and shrug it off as ‘good riddance’ because the truth of the matter is that while Congress might not get into power in the center, it could still get into power in some states. In fact, I can say for certainity that Congress will win in Amethi inspite of the well documented ‘Amethi Model of Development’ which is honestly a misnomer by Arkalgud Anantaramiya Surya Prakash for there is no “development” to speak of in Amethi since the Nehru family adopted it as its flag-bearing puppet namoona dummy stronghold. What does this remind me of?
Ah yes, a virus. it is almost like Congress is a virus and as we all know, a virus never really dies and cannot be truly eradicated – it just stays dormant for a while and when the conditions are again right, it raises its ugly head, infects and goes on its merry way to spread disease, worms, filth and all that ensues in its wake. Be as it may, even if Congress sinks without a trace in this and forthcoming governments, the dynasty with its shehzada will live long and prosper like kings on the loot and plunder amassed and by brandishing and exploiting the pirated Gandhi name for generations to come and go, forever for eternity. Tsk, it takes all kinds to make this world.

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As a matter of principle and in the interests of keeping my sanity, I tend to veer away from politics, especially India politics, for it is like the fatalistic song of sirens (hey, a nautical reference), or rather the cacophony of ugly fat corrupt neethi jaathi viswaasam leni neech kameene somberi bevarse haraam khor shehzade pigs (sorry, pigs) that many a sailor, or rather the illiterate ignoramuses sad excuse of sheeple called Indians has been lured to waste inexplicable inconceivable unimaginable unrecoverable amounts of time and many a ships have crashed on the never-ending jagged useless rocks of maggot poo that media tends to portrait as democracy, particularly, the cheap nautanki gutter circus called India democracy. According to Wikipedia, the Greek mythology lore on Sirens says that the song of the sirens is irresistible but since they reside beyond unpassable reefs and rocky coasts, shipwreck was a given and the sailors preyed upon by the sirens like cannibals or left on the coast without food and water to rot into stinking corpses. Either way, the allegory has a simile to India politics, or poltics in general, and is it any wonder that I try with all my wee physical and disturbed mental might to veer away? But I suppose that boat has sailed (hey, another nautical metaphor – my mom is right, I am special and so are my teachers – I am a smart cookie after all) and so, while my boat is crashing into the rocks and am coaxed by the sweeper to MLA/MP/ZP campaigning in a beemer to vote, let me just say that am voting for change and hopefully, progress. It could be any party or candidate. I shudder to advise especially to bonafide idiots who have by and large voted time and again for a dynasty and monarchy to rule for 60+ years directly or indirectly or by proxy of this hopelessly wretched country but while I do not really care if any of you vote or not, but if you do like am going to even if its only because it is fashionable, here is a plea to vote for change and hopefully, progress and while at it, try to veer away from politics whose operative word is ‘tics’ which even animals would attest are blood sucking, disease spreading, scalp itching, skin irritating, ear infecting, greedy bloated parasites. Put any political symbolism like khadi and ticks become politicians. Ipso facto. QED.

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Now that the Lok-Sabha elections are underway, here is a message from a psuedo-sponsor, I-Am-Aam, that there are consquences to selling votes. So, please do us all a favour, and more importantly, do yourselves a big favour and do not sell your votes for it could not only lead to metaphorical death of integrity but also an undignified cruel physical death by bills, taxes, poverty, starvation, garbage, disease etc. – You have been told nicely and have been warned. Full story here at CWorks.

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There is a saying, but I’d rather say that it is an observational comedy quirk that one keeps waiting for a bus for ages and then suddenly, 3 of them arrive at once. This always rung true in an earlier life when I used to take the bus and I was always fascinated by this phenomenon as it seemed magical and annoying at the same time. Am sure, some graduate student somewhere in this vast planet is figuring it out but while science catches up, here is my imagination running wild explanation that involves a cute cat (colour me viral attention seeking but am told that everybody likes a cute cat, or rather the idea of a cute cat) and the principle of butterflyeffect etc. -
Now that I thunk about it, I have also found that if one replaces the bus in an analogy reflecting life like an email or opportunity or guests or ideas et al., it has often held true. Well, your mileage might vary but the error could atmost be +/- 1 bus. No?